Utilizing the Constitution to Stop ISIS

by Weam Namou

When I picked up my kindergartner from school the other day, he was wearing a white, red, and blue paper hat he made in class. I asked him what it was for, and he said, smiling, “It’s constitushi day.”

“What?” I asked.

“It’s constitushi day,” he said with an even bigger smile.

“Mom, it’s Constitution Day,” my daughter explained.

I was glad that the teachers had the children pay special attention to this important day, so kids can learn the value of the constitution at an early age. As drafted, the Constitution’s purpose was to create a government that had enough power to act on a national level, but without so much power that individual’s fundamental rights would be at risk.

But many adults need to revisit the values of the Constitution, and act upon this privilege that in many countries is obsolete. Having been raised under Saddam’s totalitarian regime, I can tell you that people in the United States do not fully utilize the political freedoms bestowed upon them. Oftentimes this freedom is taken for granted. If that continues, I’m afraid that one day we will see ISIS strolling around in our neighborhoods.